’"Mr. D’Arcy,” I said, “I suspect you.”

’"Suspect me, Miss Wynne?”

’"I suspect that generous heart of yours.  I suspect you are merely inventing a post for me to fill, because you pity me.”

’"No, Miss Wynne; upon my honour this is not so.  I will not deny that if it were not in your power to do me the service that I ask of you, I should still feel the greatest disappointment if you passed from under this roof.  Your scruples about living here as you lived during your illness—­simply as my guest—­I understand, but do not approve.  They show that you are not quite so free from the bondage of custom as I should like every friend of mine to be.  The tie of friendship is, in my judgment, the strongest of all ties, stronger than that of blood, because it springs from the natural kinship of soul to soul, and there is no reason in the world why I should not offer you a home as a friend, or why, if the circumstances of our lives were reversed, you should not offer me one.  But in this case it is the fact that the service I am asking you to render me is greater than any service I can render you.”

’I was so deeply touched by his words and by his way of speaking them, that my lips trembled, and I could make no reply.

’"It is a shame,” he said, “for me to talk about business so soon after your recovery.  Let us leave the matter for the moment, and come to me in the studio during the morning, and let me show you the pictures I am painting, and some of my choice things.”

’The morning wore on, and still I sat pondering over the situation in which I found myself.  The servant came and removed the breakfast things, and her furtive glances at me showed that I was an object at once familiar and strange to her.  But very little attention did I pay to her, in such a whirl of thoughts as I then was.  The moment that one course of action seemed to me the best, the very opposite would occur to me as being the best.  However, I was determined to know from Mr. D’Arcy, and at once, what was the state in which I was when I was brought to this place, and what had been the course of my life during my stay here.  Mr. D’Arcy had told me that, for reasons which he so touchingly alluded to, he had not used me as a model.  How, then, had my time been passed?  To question poor Mrs. Titwing would only be to frighten her.  I would ask Mr. D’Arcy for a full confession.

’Mrs. Titwing came into the room.  She began pulling at the ribbon of her black silk apron as though she wanted to speak and could not find the proper words.  At last she said,

’"I hope, miss, there have been no words between you and Mr. D’Arcy?”

‘’"Words between me and Mr. D’Arcy?  What do you mean?” I asked.

’"He seems very much upset, miss, about something.  He is not at his easel, but keeps walking about the studio, and every now and then he asks where you are.  I’m sure he used to dote on you when you were a child, miss.”